| Deutsch and Yarmolinsky, comps. Modern Russian Poetry. 1921. | | | | Prayer | | By Anna Akhmatova |
| | | GIVE me comfortless seasons of sickness, | |
| Visitations of wrath and of wrong | |
| On my house; Lord, take child and companion, | |
| And destroy the sweet power of song. | |
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| Thus I pray at each matins, each vespers, | 5 |
| After these many wearying days, | |
| That the storm-cloud which broods over Russia | |
| May be changed to a nimbus ablaze. | | | | |
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